Recycler coming to North Bay: Granutech waits on ministry approval for recycling plant.

• Author: Ross, Ian
• Position: NORTH BAY - Granutech Canada Recycling Ltd.

North Bay is poised to add a green-tech element to the city's collection of mining service companies.

Quebec's Granutech Canada Recycling Ltd. intends to expand operations into the Gateway City and create between 40 and 50 jobs initially.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

The move potentially represents a $12-million to $15-million investment in the city

Although the company offers a smorgas-board of recycling and green-tech services, they see a unique market in Ontario for recycling the massive off-the-road (OTR) tires used in mining and forestry.

Vice-president of sales and marketing Jean-Claude Avoine bills his company as the "spearhead of OTR recycling in North America."

The company has agreed to purchase a 20-acre Birchs Road property to build a plant, conditional on securing a provincial Certificate of Approval to operate in Ontario.

Avoine doesn't expect any snags on the environmental or expansion financing end.

"We don't foresee any major problems to hit our targets."

Because Granutech is introducing a new technology to Ontario, North Bay economic development officer Marla Tremblay's been working with the company to secure the approval from the Ministry of Environment.

Although it is a "long and onerous" process, Tremblay hears Granutech's application is a priority item at the ministerial level because there are no proven processors in Ontario that can recycle over-sized tires.

"The only one in Canada is us," said Avoine. "A lot of tires we process in Quebec are from Ontario, so it's worth it for us to make the move."

Granutech's application plays into the Ontario Tire Stewardship Plan to have all the province's scrap tires processed here within five years.

If all goes well, they could be approved by December, start construction of 100,000-square-foot building by next spring and be operational by fall.

Equipment will be set up to process 75,000 tons per year in North Bay, roughly the equivalent of 7.5 million car tires.

The process involves no incineration, but uses their own innovative technology that shreds all kinds of tires and recovers the steel and rubber which can be sold as crown and playground rubber.

"We are recycling 100 per cent of every tire we get."

The rubber pellets they make can be used as a fuel mix in mill co-generation plants. However, burning rubber for power is prohibited in...